Community Builder Award
(Formerly Graham Emslie Award)
This award celebrates a community builder who has shown an extraordinary commitment to decent, safe and affordable housing or who has shown dedication to ending and preventing homelessness in their community.
CHRA may choose to give out two awards, one for an organization and one for an individual in this category.
Focus: community development; local level community impact.
Eligibility Criteria:
The nominee;
- is an individual, a business or an organization,
- Has created initiatives that result in housing or a homelessness program that is inclusive and builds connection within the community,
- has an outstanding capacity to leverage local community resources and engage key stakeholders in an effort to make housing more affordable and/or to end homelessness,
- is an agent of change who animates grassroots engagement, and
- is a CHRA member in good standing.
Nomination and Selection Process
- Nominations must come from CHRA members in good standing, either individuals or organizations.
- A nomination consists of a completed nomination form, a nomination letter of approximately 500-750 words and a minimum of one short letter of support.
- The CHRA Awards Committee selects and recommends award recipients to the CHRA Board of Directors for final decision. The Awards Committee may add to the list of nominees.
- A non-selected nomination may be re-submitted in a subsequent year.
- Awards are presented at the awards luncheon held during the National Congress on Housing and Homelessness.
- For selected recipients, CHRA will request, in February/March, archival photos, newspaper clippings, etc. for compiling a short promotional video for use in the awards presentation.
Award Guidelines
The nomination and presentation of CHRA awards will be guided by the following terms:
- Nominations must come from CHRA members in good standing, either individuals or organizations.
- For four of the CHRA awards - the Community Builder, the Sustainability Award, the CHRA-Rooftops International Service Award and the Lifetime Achievement Award - the nominee must be a CHRA member in good standing.
- CHRA is not obliged to present each award annually if insufficient nominations are received or those received do not adequately meet the award criteria. Upon internal review, nominees may be transferred into a different, more appropriate award category.
- A nomination consists of a completed nomination form, a nomination letter of approximately 500-750 words and a minimum of one letter of support.
- The Awards Committee may extend the deadline by one or two weeks to promote further submissions. CHRA members currently sitting as an elected officer of the Board of Directors or currently participating in the Awards Committee are not eligible for receipt of a CHRA award although they may act as nominator or supporter. Board members and Awards Committee members should abstain from voting on any awards where they were the nominator, wrote a letter of support or have a conflict of interest. A conflict of interest would occur if the Board member works at the same organization as a nominee, works with a nominee, or could occur for any other reason determined by the Board member.
- A non-selected nomination may be re-submitted in a subsequent year by the nominator, revising the submission as needed.
- The CHRA Awards Committee selects and recommends award recipients to the CHRA Board of Directors for final decision. The Awards Committee selects the CHRA award winners through a consensus process, aided by an evaluation matrix. The CHRA-Rooftops International Service Award is an exception, administered by Rooftops Canada/Abri International.
- Award recipients will be presented with their memento by the CHRA President or designate during the awards luncheon at CHRA's National Congress on Housing and Homelessness. The ticket for the award winner and guest(s) attendance at the awards luncheon is complimentary.
- If an award recipient is unable to attend the awards luncheon at CHRA's National Congress on Housing and Homelessness National Congress, an alternate presentation opportunity will be considered. Otherwise their award will be mailed to them.
Past Recipients
The CHRA Community Builder Award was formerly named the Graham Emslie Award, after a former CHRA president.
2022 Action-Habitation
2021 Blue Door
2020 Alberta Rural Development Network
2019 Linda E. Ross Property Management
2018 North End Community Renewal Corporation
2017 Choices for Youth
2016 Vancouver Native Housing Society
2015 Debbie Di Chiaro
2014 Clark Brownlee
2013 Karen Stone
2012 Ed Stelmach
2011 Don McBain
2010 Jocelyn Greene
2009 Chris Moore
2008 Daniel Thomas (Tom) Moore
2007 Alice Sundberg
2006 Wood Buffalo Housing and Development Corporation
2005 Bruce Pearce
2004 Cameron Gray
2003 Jim Graham
2002 FOHM (la Fédération des OSBL d'habitation de Montréal)
2001 The National Coalition on Housing and Homelessness
2000 Jim O'Dea
1999 Karen O'Shaughnessy
1998 Atlantic People's Housing Ltd.
1997 Andrea Horwath
1996 Lynn Hannley
1995 Chaviva Hosek
1994 John Sewell
1993 Albert Rose
1992 Groupe de resources techniques
1991 NO AWARD
1990 George Cook
1989 Humphry Carver
1988 Sylvia Goldblatt